


dandelion daze

by viscountfrancisbacon



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Gladio-centric, Identity Issues, Identity Reveal, like half subterfuge half uncomfortable conversations half gladio's very bad no good day, minor amounts of subterfuge, warnings for uhhhh allusions to the kind of nastiness you'd expect involving MTs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-09-06
Packaged: 2019-06-24 15:05:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15633156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viscountfrancisbacon/pseuds/viscountfrancisbacon
Summary: a chance encounter with a dying MT uncovers a secret gladio rather thinks he never should've found out, and gives him questions he can't answer at a time when the answer could determine everything for him and the people he loves. but gladio's the kind of man who prides himself on putting his duty ahead of his feelings, so - what is his duty? who can he trust? and who does he protect?(fic is 100% written and edited already, chapters will go up once every week)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i started this fic in march, finished it almost two weeks ago, and it proceeded to sit on my hard drive completely done because i couldn't think of what to tag it as lmao. have this fun fic where gladio figures out that prompto's an MT way ahead of schedule and proceeds to have A Lot Of Feelings about it. because i thought it would be fun and that the world could use more gladio-centric fic. enjoy!

What’s remarkable, really, is that he never happened to notice before.

The guys and him are on a hunt. A small herd of spiracorns, in getting a little too close to the banks of the Wennath, have spooked the folks in Old Lestallum. It’s marked as an intermediate level hunt, and spiracorns can be downright nasty if you rile them up, but the tipster who hands them the bounty poster does so with not even a second glance or extra word of warning. Which is either their reputation as hunters preceding them or the tipster being lax on the job – Gladio rather hopes it’s the latter, even though shit like that could get someone killed. But the more people recognize them, the more people might _recognize_ them, and the last thing Gladio needs today is someone calling in an anonymous tip and letting the Empire know to send a dropship over.

And because the Astrals have a sick sense of humor, they end up fighting the spiracorns _and_ a squad of MTs _and_ a pack of havocfangs _at the same time_. The hunt turns from manageable to desperate fourway clusterfuck in seconds, and then there’s nothing to do but grit his teeth and plow through it. And plow through it Gladio does, because the Astrals had the grace at least to see that Gladio inherited every inch of the legendary Amicitia vitality and every inch of their equally legendary ability to fuck shit up with a sword as tall as they are.

So Gladio swings, lets his momentum and the weight of the greatsword pull him into a rolling dodge, throws himself to his feet and swings again. With so many targets he barely needs to aim, a whirlwind of blood and steel guided only by his own instincts and his friends’ occasional hollered directions.

But eventually the last enemy falls – Ignis shredding a dying spiracorn’s hamstrings with his daggers as it charges him, Noctis seizing the moment of opportunity as it falls to drive his lance through its neck. Gladio is kneeling fifteen feet away, greatsword plunged into the ground so he can prop himself up against the reassuring solidity of it.

"Is that it? We good?” Prompto calls out from behind him.

The last spiracorn twitches a little – Noctis prods it cautiously with his lance, in case it has any strength left to gore them with those long wicked horns when they’re not expecting it – but nothing. Just electricity triggering in a dead brain, a ghost in the biological machine.

And speaking of machines – around him, the bodies of the magitek swordsmen begin to leak black smoke. Gladio watches warily for a moment, because it’s enough miasma to potentially mask a lone survivor plotting an ambush. But he does a quick count of the still corpses and finds a full squad – thank the gods for the Empire’s uniformity, because it’s always the same number – so at last Gladio heaves himself to his feet.

“We good,” Noctis calls back, after he catches his Shield’s eyes across the battlefield and receives a nod.

“Clear,” Ignis announces, somewhat unnecessarily, but as the old saying goes – it’s not paranoia if you really are imperial fugitives.

Prompto gives a ragged but happy cheer. When Gladio glances over, he watches as Prompto flips his pistol with a flourish, banishes it back into the armory on the downswing, and proceeds to literally do a little victory dance. A tired and subdued victory dance, but with lactic acid burning in every muscle all Gladio can do is watch with a combination of exasperation and bemusement.

“Oh my god, you dork, come here so we can make sure you’re not concussed or bleeding or whatever,” Noctis says fondly.

“It’s not dorky if it’s a miracle we’re still alive, dude,” Prompto says. He hops off the rock he was perched on to wander on over to where Ignis is already checking over Noctis. “Also, totally dodged, like a champ, so no concussions here.”

“Yeah? Cuz I could’ve sworn I saw you having a seizure over there.”

“My dude, if you can’t tell dance moves from a seizure you are the saddest creature on the gods green Eos and you should order Ignis to let me have the aux cord so I can remedy this tragedy.”

“Fuck no.”

“Gladio,” Ignis says, “are you in danger of keeling over any time soon? Any gaping wounds we should be aware of?”

“Nope. Have fun with the kids, Iggy.”

Ignis waves a hand at him dismissively and Gladio takes it as a cue to turn away, leaving the younger two in his capable hands. The three of them usually rest after a fight, but Gladio prefers to get to work right away. Because he knows if he stops now, it’ll be that much harder to get up later, and this way he can make doubly sure there’s nothing nasty waiting for them.

Gladio dismisses his greatsword and pulls out a long, sharp hunting knife – better for close quarters, and he’s got his eye on those havocfangs and their shaggy hides. But then he catches movement in his peripheral, through the rising miasma and a little ways away from where the bulk of the fighting happened.

He wanders over slowly, picking his way past the dead with his eyes on them but his focus on his target. It’s an imperial rifleman who must’ve posted up at a distance from the melee, the better to pick out his shots without getting skewered. But something got him nonetheless, and now the long grass around him is flecked with black blood and trampled beneath his shuddering body.

Gladio considers him a moment, but he can see the trooper’s gun has been tossed well out of reach, and it’s enough blood that he probably doesn’t have any fight left in him – and if Gladio just plunges his greatsword in willy-nilly, he might destroy valuable salvage. So instead Gladio keeps his grip on his hunting knife and gets close enough to flip the MT onto his back with his boot.

And then he pauses. This rifleman looks no different than any other, the same chainmail and plate armor, the same kevlar tabard over it. But the featureless slitted helmet is torn open, revealing half of the face underneath. One wide red eye stares out at Gladio, the color starkly inhuman, but that’s not what gives him pause. It’s not that the eye is real, organic – it’s only misguided public belief that all of the MTs are mechanized units like the swordsmen, he’s well aware that the robot types came after and that most of the army is still cyborgs. It’s the face itself that gives Gladio pause – he _knows_ that face, somehow.

Gladio kneels. He keeps the knife as an extra precaution, but with his other hand he reaches out and fumbles for a grip on the helmet that doesn’t lead to cutting his hand on jagged metal. Eventually he finds a handhold and pulls it off, tossing it into the grass.

Prompto stares up at him. His bright red eyes are wide and glassy, black blood dribbles from a smashed nose, his blonde hair is buzzcut so close to the scalp it almost looks like he’s bald. But that’s Prompto. That’s _Prompto_.

Gladio looks over his shoulder. There across the battlefield, his friends are sitting on the ground, passing around a water bottle and talking too quietly to hear. Noctis, Ignis – and there’s Prompto. And _here’s_ Prompto, wearing imperial livery and bleeding out in the grass.

“Astrals,” Gladio murmurs. His grip on his hunting knife is white knuckled – it does not shake only because he has been too well trained for too long to do that. “Fucking _Astrals_. What is this?”

The Astrals, fucking or otherwise, do not answer him. The rifleman who wears his friend’s face doesn’t even seem to notice Gladio is there, but he’s not quite dead. He’s twitching like the spiracorn, but Gladio has spent time learning how to tell the difference between _only mostly dead_ and _yeah that’s dead alright_ because the latter is rarely dangerous but the former sure as hell can be. The rifleman doesn’t seem dangerous, though. Mostly he just seems… pitiable.

Though it is not quite pity that Gladio feels. What he feels in fact has little to do with pity, because he knows he’s looking at a dying MT but he _feels_ like he’s looking at a dying friend and that makes something hot and heavy clench his heart in its fist. But Prompto’s not dying, he’s not, he’s safe and he’s right over there. It’s just that the rifleman lying in the grass shares his features so perfectly they might as well be identical twins.

But Gladio knows they’re not. Knows damn well the truth is much more horrifying than that, though even in his mind he doesn’t want to admit it.

He is hardly the first Lucian to have unmasked an MT. They used to think the cyborgs were made from imperial citizens. Volunteers, or more likely conscripts. Then their spies dove deeper, and began to send back reports of vast military complexes, barracks and training facilities too self-contained to be filled with citizen soldiers, reports of great chambers filled with vats where human beings were grown like crops in a field.

Intelligence asked the field operatives to confirm, and all Glaives and the Crownsguard agents who fought on the front lines conferred. They found that every one of them who had ever seen an MT’s face had seen the same one. MT’s weren’t just cyborgs. They were clones.

Prompto’s much too young to be the original. Gladio can’t think of a reason why the Empire would make most of their clones into magitek infantry but leave a few to live their own lives. There is only one explanation that makes sense.

Gladio sits back on his heels, staring at the rifleman as the rifleman stares sightlessly back with those red eyes. Which Prompto doesn’t have; his eyes are blue, and he bleeds red, and – there are a hundred things, big and small, that make him different from an MT. He can’t think of anything but the face that’s the same.

Except... Gladio looks at the knife in his hand, lips pursed. He nearly hesitates, but, well. He’s handled plenty of MT corpses before – moving them, finishing them off, policing the bodies for usable equipment. And this one isn’t even quite dead yet.

He still can’t shake the feeling of wrongness when he grabs the rifleman’s limp arm and starts looking for how to unclasp his gauntlet. He quickly finds he doesn’t even need to do that, much less use his knife to cut open the underarmor. The inside of the forearm is unarmored, and sewn into the bodyglove underneath is a flap for easy access to the exact patch of skin Gladio’s looking for. He only has to undo the snaps and –

“Well,” Gladio says. He swallows hard, licks his lips and tastes sour sweat and chapstick. “I should have known,” he tells the rifleman, voice low and rough, “I should have fucking known that was no goddamn tattoo.”

He drops the MT’s arm, and – the twitching’s stopped. For a few long, breathless moments Gladio stares, then gingerly he picks the arm back up and lays it palm down on the rifleman’s chest instead. He thinks about moving his other arm, closing his eyes, saying a short prayer perhaps but – no. No.

He stands up instead. Looks uneasily down at his knife and finally dismisses it, clenching his fist around immaterial shards of blue light as the blade vanishes into the armory. Clenches his other fist, too, grinds the heels of his hands into his eyes. His breath is hot and fast against his wrists.

“What the hell,” Gladio whispers. He does what he’s always done – indulges in anger, lets it build in his chest until he’s shaking with the force and with nowhere to expel it except by gritting his teeth and letting his voice go low and _snarling_ , “What the hell, what the _hell—_ ”

He whips around, stalks across the battlefield. Catches a glimpse of a discarded helmet in the grass, identical to the one he pulled off the dead MT, and kicks it with every ounce of his considerable strength. The helmet goes flying at the same time that several important bones in Gladio’s foot go _crunch_. He makes an inarticulate noise of pain and rage and across the field the others startle and scramble to their feet.

“Gladio! Are you alright?” Ignis calls out. There’s a flash of light as someone grabs a weapon – it’s Noctis, sword in hand, ready to warp to his side.

Gladio swears he can feel a dead, red gaze heavy on his back. He grits his teeth – this time more pain than anger, as his foot throbs – and yells, “I’m fine! We’re all clear!”

“What’s up?” Noctis yells back, though he dismisses his sword at least.

He pauses a moment, casting about for an excuse, and finally desperately goes, “I – a spider ran over my foot!”

“Uh, what?”

“Regardless, Gladio, are you injured?” Ignis asks.

“I’ll be fine, go sit back down.”

The others murmur inaudibly amongst themselves, but at last they turn away and Gladio is left alone again. One man in a field full of corpses. He sits down, because putting the slightest bit of pressure on his foot makes sparks shoot across his vision. Then he reaches into the armory and snags a potion, breath hitching at the crawling, tingly sensation of bones realigning and knitting themselves back together.

There is an imperial rifleman lying dead in the grass. Prompto is an MT. Gladio has not yet recovered a single piece of salvage from this battlefield. Other than his foot, only one of these things is fixable.

He gets up and goes back to work.

 

The spoils of the fight end up being two crooked helixhorns and a handful of syringes – reflex enhancers and magitek boosters alike. In the end, despite the fact he could certainly get good gil for it, Gladio leaves the havocfangs alone. He isn’t in the mood to skin the beasts and prepare their hides, and he’s running behind as it is.

If he takes too long the others have to wait for him, because it’s not like they’ve got anything else to do. In most cases they don’t really need to clean up after a battle – scavengers will take care of the animal carcasses, and after the miasma clears human scavengers will eventually pick over the remains of the MTs. Whatever the robotic types are made of, when they’re destroyed they leave behind nothing but noxious daemonic miasma and a shell that can be scrapped for parts and sometimes ammunition. The cyborgs… release a much smaller quantity of smoke, and when it clears their bodies are so putrid that even the animals seem to avoid them. But the daemons won’t.

There is bile prickling the back of his throat and a raw, aching feeling sitting hard in his chest – the remnants of his anger. He wants to go. He wants to be somewhere that’s not here.

Eventually Noctis calls out. “Gladio, you almost done?”

“I’m coming,” Gladio hollers back, happy for the excuse. He leaves the carnage without looking back.

 

Despite the first hunt going as poorly as it did, they eventually decide to cross another one off the list before calling it a day. Their next targets are a regional variant of shieldshears further up the Wennath, which has Prompto dramatically bemoaning the danger involved and Noctis letting himself get pulled into the resulting banter. Ignis argues that if they combine their disaster with the spiracorns with a prompt resolution of the shieldshears bounty, they can squeeze a little extra hazard pay out of the tipster and get an entire week’s worth of gas money for a single day’s work.

In the end, they look to Gladio to break the tie – Ignis reserved but expecting his approval, Noctis with that particular brand of nonchalance that means he could go either way, and Prompto giving him a hangdog look whose pleading is only half faked. The puppy dog eyes would be a lot more effective if Gladio didn’t see a dead man’s stare in them.

Gladio looks away and sides with Ignis. If he’s a little too gruff and dismissive in his insistence that they can take on the shieldshears – well, it’s not like he lies. Prompto is stronger than he likes to claim, and he’s their ranged specialist to boot – he’ll be fine, and the other two have had time to rest. All Gladio needs is a bit of a sitdown himself and they can deal with some giant crabs.

Ignis checks their map and gives them all a generous half hour break. Gladio has some water and takes out his phone and his earbuds, so he doesn’t have to talk to anyone. He lies down in the long grass and closes his eyes, willing the nausea to go away.

 

They deal with some giant crabs. It is an absolute pain in the ass, if not quite the level of sheer fubar that their last fight was. Once elixirs are dutifully handed out for the blunt force trauma from getting smacked around by shieldshears, and for the bleeding from nearly getting gored by shieldshears, and for some sprained ankles and bruises from the ice magic they used to weaken the shieldshears, everyone unanimously agrees to call it a day.

Ignis calls the tipster to let him know they dealt with the beasts and will be there to present proof and collect their pay tomorrow. Then he turns to them.

“Well, gentlemen, while we have certainly earned some leisure I believe it’s a little early to retire to the haven yet. How shall we occupy ourselves til then?”

Noctis cocks his head and says, with a deceptively casual air, “On the map it says there’s a fishing hole nearby, by the bridge.”

Prompto groans. “Six, Noct – I’d love to lie around and chill all day, but does it have to be fishing? It’s so… slow.”

“And you’re scared of the fish,” Noctis says, teasingly.

“Noct! Just because I refuse to touch a fish… they are _slimy_ , and _wriggly_ , and then you have to gut them while their lifeless, _beady_ little eyes watch and – _ugh_.” Prompto shudders. Then he swats Noctis’s shoulder. “’sides, unlike you I’ve got _useful_ things in mind to do. Those awful crabs blunted my poor baby’s blades—” meaning his circular saw, as the fight ended up getting a lot closer to him than Gladio had quite anticipated, “—so I was thinking, you know, gonna put on some music and do maintenance.”

Then he brightens a little and turns to Gladio and Ignis.

“I gotta clean out my guns, too. You guys wanna join in? We could go through the armory, make sure everything’s spic and span for the next horrible death match we will inevitably find ourselves in.”

That he hopes this plan will impress them is plainly obvious. Not that Gladio doubts he genuinely wants to do weapons maintenance, but it’s always been clear Prompto has a chip on his shoulder that his hasty induction into the Crownsguard has not helped in the slightest. And he looks a little more to Gladio than Ignis, because Gladio is usually the one who spearheads that task – demanding a certain level of quality from the group when it comes to stuff like that is pretty much his job as Noctis’s Shield and the most senior Crownsguard agent.

He also always thought Prompto was insecure when it came to that sort of thing because he was a pliable, inexperienced civilian who’d never picked up a real gun before they started training him. He always thought Prompto’s poorly hidden desire for Gladio’s approval as a combatant was because of his self-esteem issues, or his devotion to Noctis, or even Gladio’s own admittedly gruff demeanor. But that was when he thought Prompto was about as ordinary as ordinary got, not one of the Empire’s born and bred supersoldiers.

Behind that hesitance… was he hiding MT training, trying to pretend that he didn’t know how to fight? He was (seemingly) solidly mediocre at anything that wasn’t guns, which he picked up with surprising ease – and the Empire had always utilized firearms much more heavily than Lucis ever had. And for all Gladio knew he might have… targeting programs in his head or something, cybernetic implants, genetic engineering to made him a better shot than any unaugmented human. But the thing about it was, it didn’t feel entirely faked. Prompto had never been truly comfortable at the prospect of a fight. If that was real, he could be hiding his skills but simply be reluctant to use them, unwilling to fight until circumstance – until Noctis going to Altissia, and everything that had followed after – forced his hand.

MTs were quite literally made to be soldiers. The idea that Prompto had somehow managed to escape that, to end up living a quiet civilian life only to become (nominally) a royal agent and then an imperial fugitive because he just so happened to be the prince’s best friend—

Unless. Unless it was not a coincidence, that he was the prince’s best friend.

Now _that_ – that puts a chill down Gladio’s spine. Prompto’s background checks were clean, the more intensive background checks done when he started Crownsguard training and wasn’t a minor anymore were clean, multiple people including Gladio himself had _all_ expressed their professional opinions that he wasn’t a danger. The chances that he was actually an assassin were pretty damn low – but did the knowledge that he was secretly an MT change that?

It did. It had to, because suddenly Gladio was realizing that he’d thought he’d had Prompto basically figured out. Maybe they weren’t besties like him and Noct were, but he’d considered Prompto a friend for years, which suggested a certain level of understanding. But who knew how much of that understanding was real?

It hurt, but worse – Gladio was Noctis’s Shield. With Regis dead and Noctis all but crowned he was for all intents and purposes the Shield of the King. A king whose throne and life was in as much danger as any Lucian monarch had perhaps ever faced.

Prompto was an MT. And, even though considering it made Gladio’s gut lurch, he was now a potential threat.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> deepest apologies i meant to update this yesterday but i,,,,, forgot,,,,,, and then i was busy all day lmao. enjoy!

“Gladio.”

His name, spoken just a hair too sharply to be casual, brings Gladio back to attention in a snap. He blinks at Ignis, who looks at him mildly and says,

“Prompto was just suggesting we make use of this free time to go through the armory and perform weapons maintenance. I think it’s a good idea, but we would appreciate your opinion.”

“Yeah, I mean, like, you’re the expert big guy. Unless it’s too much work? I mean, it’s not that hard, but we did just plow through two big fights in a row, so maybe not the best idea for downtime,” Prompto chatters.

Gladio’s fists unclench. He forces down the scowl, too, as he belatedly realizes the right time to contemplate the issue of Prompto being an MT is not in the middle of a conversation with the guy. Which would explain the hint of reproach in Ignis’s eyes and how Prompto can’t even look at him, which makes Gladio’s guts twist up for entirely different reasons.

But Noctis speaks up before he can, ambling over to clap Prompto on the shoulder.

“You’re rambling, dude,” he says, with just enough warmth in his voice that it isn’t judgmental. Prompto flushes anyway.

“Yeah, I know,” he says. Noctis interrupts him.

“Specs is right, though – it’s a good idea,” he cocks his head, “though I guess your stuff probably needs it more than ours, with all the moving parts and shit. But you’ve got a point in that it’s a lot of work to do when we’re supposed to be taking a load off. Why don’t we just do some of it now and some of it later?”

Which has Prompto giving him a grateful smile, and Gladio and Ignis exchanging a glance.

Ignis responds. “Capital thinking, Noct. Might I recommend we help Prompto with his share of the armory, perhaps include some of the other mechanical weapons that will require extra attention? After that we can relax the rest of the day.”

“Orrr,” Noctis drawls, the slant of his shoulders deliberately casual, “we could split up. Make the most of the daylight while it lasts.”

Prompto pouts. “You just wanna go fishing and skip out on the hard work, don’t you.”

Noctis looks at him innocently. “You can’t very well work on the weapons next to the river, dude. Moisture's not good for the gears. Or the metal. Besides, if something bites, that’s dinner. Very productive.”

Prompto looks at Ignis. Ignis raises an eyebrow at Noctis. Noctis stares back unabashed. Gladio is mostly just glad everyone seems to have forgot his faux pas.

Ignis sighs. “Very well. The haven is not too far from the fishing spot near the bridge you’re interested in, so if there’s trouble do try to make some noise. And pay attention to your surroundings, yes? We’ve already been ambushed by the Empire once today. And avoid using your engine blade or the drain lance if you require a weapon, we’ll be pulling them out and working on them.”

“Can do. Am I taking you or Gladio with me?”

Gladio – hesitates, trying not to be obvious about how his eyes shift from Prompto to Noctis. He inhales deeply, starts to speak without knowing what’s going to come out of his mouth, and – 

“I’ll go. Been hungry for trout anyhow.” 

Probably better to stick with his charge, anyway.

 

The fishing spot is a simple wooden pier, made small and childlike the way it juts out next to the Rachsia Bridge. But Noctis lights up when he sees it, and when they get closer he raises his voice over the rush of the river and goes,

“Isn’t it great?”

Gladio shrugs. “Sure.”

Then he purses his lips, thinking, and makes a soft noise.

“Oh, right. You wanted to get the chance to fish the Wennath, yeah?”

“Hell yeah, for _years_. It’s the biggest river in the whole kingdom, been on my bucket list for ages. The salmon migrate through here.”

Salmon _are_ pretty good, though Gladio mostly appreciates them for the taste. He takes a few steps back, so Noctis doesn’t brain him summoning the fishing pole. He really must be excited, because he hasn’t even prepared anything else, and sets the pole down so he can rummage through his tackle box.

If he’d gone with Prompto, there’d be music and likely conversation as well to pay attention to, but like this Noctis will probably be an hour before he so much as says another word. So Gladio is free to sit down on the wet weathered wood and watch the river.

Astrals. It’s all such a mess – why hadn’t he _told_ anyone he wasn’t just Niflheimian by birth? As is there’s no worse way outside of violence or undeniable subterfuge for Gladio to have found out. How did Prompto even plan to explain himself? _W_ _hoops, sorry, promise I’m not a killer cyborg assassin in deep cover_? That wasn’t going to cut it after half a goddamn decade – no excuse would. Surely he knew the crown wouldn’t have done something like – like having him killed if he’d just been honest about what he was.

Although… they’ve never taken an MT alive. If nothing else Noctis would’ve flipped his shit if Prompto had ever conveniently “disappeared” – but did Prompto _know_ that? He did have self-esteem issues, and Astrals, no _wonder_. He must’ve been so scared. To grow up knowing you’re the most popular face of the boogeymen haunting Lucis’s collective nightmares, even if you don’t exactly look it–

Gladio takes a harsh breath, tastes freshwater and fresh air. What if – what if he _doesn’t_ know? Gladio only found out thanks to chance. Prompto’s parents – adoptive, of course – are by all accounts as mundane as their son supposedly is, so they might not know either. What’s more likely – that they’re also Niff plants, or that a single clone somehow made it all the way from an imperial facility to the Crown City. A clone missing some pretty standard features – does that mean a reject, or experimental? A runaway, or the Empire trying their hand at designer spies?

Gladio flops down on his back on the pier, heedless of the gross slimy feeling of the wood. He presses his hands to his face, fingers catching in hair, feeling the raised line of his scar against his palm. All he’s doing is chasing question after question with no real answers, worrying at the problem like a loose tooth. He presses harder, colored lights swimming across his eyelids. He doesn’t understand. He doesn’t understand _shit_. 

Noctis is looking at him. Gladio rearranges his expression into something less concerning and lets his hands drop to his chest. Noctis’s face is obscured by messy bangs and the sun overhead, but his voice is casual.

“Sup.”

“Sup,” Gladio responds. He closes his eyes against the glare.

Noctis nudges him with a foot. “Hey, do me a favor and get up for a sec?” 

Gladio sits up, watching faraway colored blobs cross the bridge to the sound of movement behind him. When the pier vibrates with the impact of something heavy, he looks over his shoulder – Noctis has shoved the tackle box and the cooler further back, so he can sit down with all of the blunt gracelessness Gladio so often teases him for.

“You were in the way, so I couldn’t move them,” Noctis says by way of explanation. He looks at Gladio sidelong. “You can come sit by me, if you wanna.”

Gladio hums. His muscles, tired and sore, are turning to jelly in the warm afternoon sunlight. “Yeah, sure.”

He heaves himself up and goes to sit on the edge of the pier. Noctis scoots over just far enough to make room, so his leg is pressed against Gladio’s and his boot makes a shushing noise where it rubs against Gladio’s jeans as he swings his feet.

“It’d probably be a bad idea to take my boots off and stick my feet in the water, huh,” Noctis sighs.

“With our luck? You’d end up fighting barefoot or losing a toe to a river monster. Then I’d have to punch a fish.”

He laughs. “You would, wouldn’t you?”

Gladio knocks Noct’s shoulder with his. It makes the fishing pole twitch, the lure a bright little spot of color bobbing in the water. “’Course. Can’t have my king get maimed by a river monster.” The next part sticks in his chest, but he says it anyway. “Dad would roll in his grave.”

Noctis makes a wordless noise of assent. They do not comment on the chances that either of their dads even have graves.

It’s quiet, for a few minutes. Then Gladio picks up as if he never fell silent. “Your knee bothering you?”

“Hm?”

“You’ve been favoring it a bit, since this morning.”

“You noticed?”

He’s been pretty fucking distracted for a lot of that time but – “Yeah.”

Noctis shrugs, nose wrinkled. “Starting to think that maybe I should’ve stuck to my sword instead of the lance today. It’s a good weapon for the spiracorns, and of course there’s nothing better than skewering an MT before they even hit the ground. But then I end up fighting in midair a lot and eventually—”

“Eventually you gotta land.”

“Yep,” Noctis says, enunciating the p with a pop, “Landing sucks.”

Gladio only grunts, at that, because using warp magic to break a fall is pretty basic stuff but the strain of constant warping can add up quick, and even a series of short falls can strain the joints. But he really doesn’t need to lecture Noctis about the limits of his reserves or the relative fragility of his body.

“I’ll grab my knee brace once we get back to camp,” Noctis says, confirming Gladio’s thoughts.

Then he’s the one going quiet, this time, and Gladio lets him. The lure bobs on the line, and the river rushes by, and the sun shines, and Noctis is beside him. It should be peaceful. It _is_ peaceful. But something ugly and heavy seethes in Gladio all the same.

Prompto is his friend and probably, for all he knows, an innocent man still. He watched an MT with his face die today. And yet none of that matters next to his duty, which he can’t possibly forget when his duty is right next to _him_. He doesn’t want to treat a friend like a threat. He doesn’t want to pit the safety and happiness of one against the other. But none of that matters, either.  
He’s a Shield. He’s _the_ Shield. Most of what Gladio knows about being Shield comes from his dad. Most of what his dad knows he learned from his own predecessor. Tenets have made their way to Gladio through the mouths of generations. _We are the Shield of the King._ _T_ _here is no king without a kingdom. What do we protect?_

Everything that Gladio cares about rests on a knife’s edge, these days. He has so many obligations – to Noctis, to Ignis and Prompto, Iris, Cor, the Crownsguard, all of Lucis. Can’t protect all of them, of course, which means making choices. Having priorities. Doing what is right to the best of his ability. If he loses his king, he’ll have no purpose. If he loses his kingdom, well, what’s the purpose in having a king at all then? _What do_ _es he_ _protect?_

He can’t protect all of them. He has to do what is right. There is an increasingly slim margin for error, with his home in ruins and the Empire dogging their footsteps. _What do you protect?_

“Hey, Gladio.”

Noctis glances up – Gladio is briefly glad he’s taller, and Noctis distracted, because he doesn’t want to think about what kinda faces he’s been making over Noctis’s head.

“I’m glad you came out here with me. Today has – well, lately, it’s been rough, yeah?”

“Rough’s a helluva understatement,” Gladio mutters.

Noctis elbows him gently. “Yeah, ok, it’s an unholy shitstorm. So I know you’ve probably been worried sick, with the Empire and Iris and looking after me and the guys. So I thought,” he scratches his head, slightly embarrassed, “well I _did_ really wanna fish, but I thought – you seemed to like keeping me company well enough, when we did this back home. So I just – I hope you’re getting something out of all this.”

Gladio rubs his neck, looking out at the water. “Yeah. It’s nice.”

“Hey.” Noctis twists around, lays a hand on his arm. His expression is – his expression makes Gladio think maybe he’s been a little less circumspect than he hoped he was being. “Whatever the Empire throws at us, we’ll kick its ass. Save the day. All that dumb hero shit people expect us to do, cuz I’m the King and you’re my Shield. So this is, like, your kingly pep talk. We like – we got this, you know?”

Gladio suspects that Noctis doesn’t actually think they ‘got this.’ He rather suspects Noctis is bullshitting him, but – it’s the thought that counts, which he gets. Noctis is seriously bad at royal speeches, but… he’s a good man, even if he was ridiculous sometimes, even if Gladio couldn’t always see it.

He wouldn’t be nearly so enthusiastic if he knew the part of the Empire that Gladio is worried about is Prompto. Would he be so quick to reassure, if he knew Gladio was contemplating whether or not to treat Prompto as the potential threat logic says he is? Would he be able to make the choice Gladio still can’t bear to?

Noctis looks at him, his eyes wide and bright. He looks… worried. Hopeful. Trusting. They all look at him like that, Prompto included.

His king or his kingdom. What sort of choice is that? There’s no point in having one without the other. So it’s both, of course. He protects them both.

 

With _that_ figured out, Gladio puts some serious effort into shelving the tough thoughts and genuinely enjoying the afternoon. Their lives are so hectic lately – filled with uncertainty alongside the very real and present dangers – that they have to carve out time to relax or risk burning out, a fact he is well aware of no matter how much the others might occasionally whine. No one’s there to pick up the slack if they break, after all.

So he simply – relaxes. Sits there and admires the view, now that it’s not something to distract the lower portions of his brain so the higher functions can better worry. It’s not the most stimulating activity, but he can’t read or use his phone so close to the water. Or he could, but then he’d have to move.

“Aw, not gonna watch the master at work?” Noctis says when Gladio lies down, legs still dangling over the edge. It’s an awkward position his tired muscles are not going to thank him for later, but hey, they’re not the ones in charge here.

“’s fishing, Noct, not rocket science,” Gladio mumbles, already succumbing to the warmth and the white noise of the river. “Lemme sleep.”

Noctis pats him affectionately on the chest. There’s a smile in his voice. “Don’t blame me if you end up getting splashed, then.”

He doesn’t get splashed, but he makes good on that promise to punch a fish when Noctis has fun with him by dangling a catch over his head.

 

“Cool, Ignis moved the car,” Noctis says, when they’re close enough to make out the Regalia from the blocky black blur parked next to the little dirt path that goes up to the haven. “Was wondering if we were gonna have to ride into town and put the camping stuff into the armory to get it all here. Weren’t we gonna leave it in Old Lestallum?”

Gladio glances over, then off in the direction he thinks they found the spiracorns in, this morning. It feels a lot longer ago than that. “Yeah, he texted me about it. Said he changed his mind. It’s more convenient, and he doesn’t want anything happening to the Regalia while we’re away.”

Specifically, he’d also forbidden that exact plan – useful though it’d proven, at times – on the grounds it was too risky to use the armory for something so hard to hide in such a populated area. Old Lestallum wasn’t nearly the size of its sister city, but s _omeone_ was bound to notice if they made an entire trunk’s worth of equipment disappear into thin air with magic.

Noctis probably understands that, but when his expression tightens a little it’s clearly at the thought of endangering his dad’s car.

“Yeah,” he says, nodding firmly, “can’t have anything happening to the old girl. I mean, we just got her repainted again, like, a week ago.”

“Yep. Be a pity to see anything happen to Cindy’s hard work. That lady’s an artist with the airbrush.”

They pull up next to the car, and Noctis dismounts with a laugh, already pulling out his keys.

“Yeah, dude, that’s why they call it a brush. Oh – I guess they haven’t set up yet.”

Gladio leans over and sure enough, the gear’s all still there, as neatly packed as ever because Astrals know they’d never fit everything in otherwise. He dismounts Lizabetta and skritches the spot under the chin she likes in thanks. The bird chirps happily and nudges at his hand for more.

“Might still be busy working on the guns. Or, hell, maybe they were saving the work for when we got here.” Gladio pauses, lips pursed. He glances at the haven, but neither of the other guys seem to be coming out to meet them. And Noctis doesn’t look very enthusiastic about having to unpack their entire setup. He reaches out and claps him on the shoulder, forcing a casual expression. “Relax, Your Highness, I can handle getting this all outta the car. Tell you what, I’ll pull out the birds’ stuff first and you can go settle them in for the night instead.”

Noctis perks up a little. “Cool,” he says, and then he grins back as he gathers up Lizzy’s reins, “not gonna lie, man, you’ve been a little weird today, but if you’re going soft or something I’m totally into it.”

Gladio heaves a crate out of the car, trying to remember where he left the bucket of greens. It must’ve been somewhere close to the front, they fed the birds this morning before they left town.

“Whatever. Tell Iggy I’ll get the cooking gear ready to be taken up first.”

“Cool.”

Noctis takes the bucket from him, slings a case of chocobo supplies over his shoulder. Mittens follows faithfully when he whistles for her – or maybe she just smells her dinner on him. They start climbing up the slope for the haven proper, and Gladio starts unpacking the trunk in earnest.

He has to work fast, if he wants his improvised plan to succeed. Luckily they usually try to leave the food and the grill close to the front, so it’s not hard to get those pulled out first. If he piles them at the front of the Regalia whoever comes down to get them won’t come around the back, or at least he’ll see them coming if they do. Their personal luggage is near the front, too – he pulls all four bags out, as well as the chairs and another bucket of greens for good measure. Three of the bags and the other stuff gets left where he puts it, so it looks like he’s busy.

Prompto’s bag, meanwhile, goes back in the trunk, propped up on top of unloaded cargo. This would be a lot easier if he had a table to work on, but he’ll survive. The important thing is making sure he doesn’t get caught, because he really won’t be able to explain why he’s going through Prompto’s stuff. And he’s gotta remember his training, because when it comes to hands-on experience he’s mainly done security checks on rooms with the occasional bout of frisking people.

All right – start with the side pockets. Some ends and odds, toiletries, a few rolled up socks he very much hopes are clean. He runs his fingers along the seams and the rivets, checking for bugs or hidden compartments. Nothing. The main compartment is mostly clothes, and thankfully Prompto’s a bit of a sloppy folder because Gladio’s on a time limit – and there, against the setting sun, a silhouette appears, begins to descend from the haven. More clothes, underwear he _doubly_ hopes is clean, a folder full of papers.

Then Gladio’s heart jumps into his throat, because there underneath a certificate of Lucian citizenship is a sealed plastic bag with an envelope bearing the personal crest of the Fleurets – formerly staunch allies of Lucis, now imperial retainers for the past twelve years, and the family of both the Oracle and the new Imperial High Commander. 

It’s good stationary, though not particularly fancy for ex-royalty. He can tell the letter is old before he even sees the date at the top, because the creases have gone all soft and worn, like it’s been folded and unfolded a lot.

The signature is Lady Lunafreya’s, though, not her brother’s. Gladio skims the contents of the letter and his heart abruptly reverses direction, sinking into his stomach instead. He feels like he’s missing some of the context – the Messenger dogs who serve the Oracle can transverse space itself, how the hell can they get _lost_? – but he understands just enough to know that he shouldn’t be seeing this. To know that to stand here, hidden behind a car with this letter in his hands, is a transgression. Astrals, this is why nobody should investigate their friends. He feels like scum.

“’Sup!”

_Fuck_. Gladio’s blood pressure does something drastic and ill-advised. He folds the letter gently, slides it back into the envelope while forcing his expression into something that feels, not normal, but hopefully in the same ballpark as normal.

“Sup,” he calls back. He leans around the open hood of the trunk, “you guys get the maintenance done?”

Prompto grins and gives him a thumbs up. “Yep, that’s just about one fourth of the armory good to go my dude. You, um, you can double check if you feel like it, but me and Ignis went through everything together and I think we did good.”

He’s sure they did. Ignis will have been his usual meticulous self, and despite the fact that his weapons are the most complex of the bunch Prompto takes good care of them. But he should probably check the armory for hidden surprises too, so – perfect excuse.

“Yeah, they should be good. I’ll check them later, though, just in case.” And then Gladio ducks back behind the hood. He runs a hand through his hair, exhales hard. Goes to put the envelope away but – no, that was stupid, rookie mistake. He picks a strand of hair – too long and too brown to be anyone but him – out of Prompto’s open bag and flicks it away, silently cursing his own nerves.

“Cool. Are you gonna take everything out of the car first, or should I just…” Gladio peeks around the hood again. Prompto is hovering over the cooking supplies, but when he sees him staring he makes to move around them and head his way.

“ _No_.” His heart continues to have fucking palpitations. At this rate he’ll have a heart attack and the Empire will kill him so indirectly it won’t even be funny. “I— Take that stuff first. I put it there so Iggy could get started on dinner.”

Prompto jerks to a halt at the first word. By the time Gladio is done talking he’s already pivoted around, grabs the cooler by the handle.

“Cool, that’s cool. We’re having – I don’t remember what Iggy said we were having tonight? Something fishy, cuz you know, like, it’s fresh. I’ll start taking this up, then, and you just. Holler if you need help, kay?”

Gladio braces his hands on either side of the open trunk and hangs his head, eyes closed. “Yeah, sure,” he calls. There’s the sound of footsteps and something being dragged across the dirt, the scrape of plastic on rock. Farther away – the distant sound of a fire crackling, crickets chirping in the distance as the evening grows darker.

“Fuck me,” Gladio murmurs. He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Get it together, man.”

The envelope goes back in its plastic baggie. The baggie goes back in the folder. The folder goes back in the bag, nestled safely halfway down. There’s nothing else of note there, so he moves on to Prompto’s camera bag. That one is tricky, because specialized equipment like that could easily be hiding something, but on the other hand he absolutely can’t take any of it apart like he _technically_ should for fear of breaking something. But primarily he’s looking for bugs or tracking devices, and he knows what the Niff-made ones look like because he’s been trained for it, and as far as he can tell – it’s clean. Prompto’s stuff is clean.

It’s not enough for Gladio to reasonably clear him, but – he zips up Prompto’s camera bag and puts it on the pile of discarded luggage and slumps against the Regalia, covering his mouth and just _breathing_ , for a minute. It’s something. He’s done… _something_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the part that really sucks about writing the whole fic beforehand is that then i never have much to say about individual chapters, lmao, cuz i wrote them all ages ago. see you all next week!~


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading!

They have dinner. It’s normal, which is to say it’s good – and keeping his mouth full of Ignis’s cooking is a great way to avoid having to saying too much. The others mostly make small talk about the day – the hunts, what they did during the afternoon, and plans for tomorrow. 

Opinions are divided on whether they should risk staying in the area after getting caught by the patrol from this morning, or if they should finish their business around Old Lestallum before moving on. Ignis’s natural inclination is to be paranoid about it – or _acting with_ _appropriate caution_ _given_ _our situation_ , as he calls it – but since he drives half the time he seems miffed about the idea of backtracking. Noctis is in a mood where he wants to face their problems head on, though, and since there’s a report of a hunter going MIA near here that Dave asked them to look into he’s digging his heels in about it. Prompto doesn’t really speak up either way, until Gladio thinks he’s going to be called on as the tiebreaker, but eventually Prompto pipes up.

“I think Noct’s right. I mean, I’d rather deal with more MTs than find out later we basically let a hunter beef it out there, you know? Even if they’re already gone, the body’s gotta be easier to find the sooner we look.”

Ignis pushes up his glasses and rubs at the bridge of his nose, which is how Gladio knows this is actually worrying him. “It is truly not my intention to sound insensitive, but I believe you overestimate our responsibility in this scenario. If we manage to find this hunter, that’s good, but if they die – or are already dead – it’s hardly our fault.”

“I— yeah. I know that.”

“As far as I can determine, the Empire tends to send response teams somewhere within a 48 hour window. We can always leave briefly and then return to search later, once the most likely danger has passed and we won’t be ambushed in the middle of our attempts to find the missing hunter.”

Prompto tugs at a lock of his hair, brow furrowed. “Well… the spot Dave pointed out to us is mostly trees and brush, right?”

“Yep,” Noctis says around a mouthful of fish – which might be why Ignis gives him a dirty look for it.

“So a magitek engine’s gonna have a hard time spotting four guys past all that, especially if we don’t ride the chocobos too much and stick to cover.”

“Hmm,” Ignis says. He crosses his legs and looks to Gladio. “And you, Gladio? I’d like your opinion on this.”

He really must be stressed – Ignis is usually a _little_ more more tactful when he’s angling for backup. Unfortunately for him, Gladio agrees with the other guy.

“Sorry, man. It’s 3-to-1. Kid’s got the right of it.”

Ignis sighs and gives him a look. Noctis chuckles and leans over to high five his best friend. Prompto takes the high five, smiling – looking a little too happy that Gladio’s taken his side, which probably means Gladio is continuing to fuck up in _that_ department, but damned if he knows what to do about it. Unless… well, two birds with one stone has worked pretty well for him today.

Gladio gives Ignis a wide, toothy grin and hauls himself to his feet. “You wanna argue the point, Iggy—” He reaches out and grasps something that doesn’t exist in this dimension, blue light spilling in a line from either end of his fingers. The drain lance crystallizes into being, the ignition growling as Gladio flips it around for good measure, the business end coming to rest on the stone with a gentle _tck_. “—argue it with _this_ point.”

Ignis rolls his eyes. “Showoff.”

“Hey,” Noctis pouts, pointing a finger at Gladio. “Ignis doesn’t even use the drain lance, _I_ do, make your point with someone else’s weapon.”

Gladio flips the lance right side up again. He sits down, moving most of the shaft out of the way so he can examine the top half. The blade looks clean and polished, though Gladio knows better than to run his finger along the wicked looking edges to test them when the engine’s on and the whole thing’s vibrating gently in his hands.

He turns the shiteating grin on Noctis. “Aw, but this one’s nice ‘n sharp,” he lets his gaze drift over to Prompto beside him, turns down the snark a little and gives him a nod. “You guys worked hard today, huh? It looks good.”

Prompto shrugs and demurs, though not even the hand cradling his face can hide his smile. “Ignis was the one who sharpened the blades, mostly. I handled the guns and the gears.”

“Though not for lack of expertise on his part, I assure you. If anything, it’s myself who ended up with the easier task – I’m afraid I’ve a bit of a daub hand with anything more complex than a sharp edge.”

Noctis gets up and comes over, hovering over Gladio’s shoulder to look at the drain lance. He brushes his thumb down the flat of the blade, likely admiring it just like Gladio did, before depressing the main lever. The engine rumbles, the vibration kicking up a notch and making the whole thing shake with a _tcka-tcka-tck_ as the butt clatters against the ground. Noctis grins, not a faux challenge like Gladio, but genuine appreciation with pride underneath.

“Damn, I forgot how badass this thing is.” He reaches further down and grabs the base of the shaft. Gladio lets him pull it out of his hands, burnished steel brushing against his shoulder. Noctis gives a pleased little sigh. “Shit, Gladio, you’re right. Like, who even cares if another patrol finds us with weapons like these? It is so satisfying to skewer MTs with this thing.”

Gladio’s burgeoning good mood curdles instantly. He wants to recoil, but – no. How would he explain that? He grips the armrest of his chair tighter, instead, and tighter still, so he can feel the metal beneath the canvas. Hopefully everyone’s looking up at Noct and not at him.

“Noct,” Ignis says, mild rebuke in his voice. Gladio can hear Noctis give a little huff of displeasure. “Please.”

“I know, I know. Fighting the Empire is hard and shitty but we don’t have a choice. Can I get a _little_ gallows humor here, Specs?”

Ignis purses his lips. “I understand perfectly well the benefit of such things, but don’t you think you’re—” He sighs, looks askance. “No, it’s— I overreacted. Carry on.”

“It’s cool, Iggy,” Prompto says, looking between Ignis and him – no, between Ignis and Noctis. He looks vaguely upset, but no more than he usually gets when someone else gets upset, because he’s an empathetic sorta guy. Which makes Gladio’s guts churn, because – he’s an MT. Noctis just happily expressed a desire to kill people like him. As a complement to the very weapon Prompto spent today tuning up. It is five kinds of fucked up and he doesn’t even look _fazed_ , which suggests either a much better poker face or significantly more horrific self-esteem issues than Gladio ever thought he had.

The guys are still talking around him, and Noctis has moved away, but Gladio tunes them out.

Astrals, come to think of it, how many MTs have they even killed? Not counting the ones who are actually robots – who had fucking better _just_ be robots or Gladio will actually lose his shit. It’s gotta be approaching a three digit number by now, and now Gladio knows the face behind every one of them, and it’s Prompto’s face. And Gladio can’t even think of all the killing as unnecessary, because at the bare minimum – disregarding his job, his loyalty, and his absolute refusal to ever bend knee to Iedolas – it’s a matter of survival. Noctis’s not wrong about them not having a choice – Prompto could probably survive if they lose, Ignis _possibly_ if he abandoned everything he believes in and got lucky, but the only question for him and Noct is how long the Emperor will make them wait before he has their heads.

He can’t not fight them. He’s going to have to keep cutting them down knowing what they look like, knowing that they look like Prompto, that they could have _been_ Prompto, and there’s no way out. There’s no way out.

He really hates thinking about killing right after dinner. Gladio is so repulsed his stomach turns over like it wants to repulse everything inside it. He’s lived with this secret for a day and it’s already making him physically ill. 

How is Prompto still _sane_? Maybe it gets easier to compartmentalize the longer you live with it, though he hates the thought that Prompto’s used to something like the mix of fear and anger and disgust that he feels now. Except – there’s too much about him that seems genuine, for him to be shutting away parts of himself that strongly. Prompto would have either put on a better front or broken down completely, surely, and he just seems… normal, which can’t be right. He was shocked and sad and terrified when Insomnia fell and then – Gladio’s throat tightens. Then they fought MTs for the first time, and afterwards in a quiet moment Prompto sought him out, and they had a shorter, rehashed version of the “how to deal with killing” talk that he knows Prompto got as part of his Crownsguard training.

By the Six, like that wasn’t the first time _Gladio_ killed a living, sapient being. Like it wasn’t for all of them. And Prompto looked at him like he knew what he was doing.

“Gladio,” Ignis says.

That’s the second time today he’s done that. Which means – Gladio looks around. Prompto’s gone, as is Noctis. He can guess where they went, through, because there’s light and muffled cartoony noises coming from the tent. The tent that’s been zippered up. Ignis’s voice is firm, but he doesn’t seem vaguely reproachful this time, just – intent. Oh, _hell_.

“Um,” Gladio says. “I—huh.”  
“You’re… upset.”

Gladio swallows his first response – _gee I fucking wonder why_ – and his second response – hysterical yelling. But. Well. Ignis clearly knows _something_ is up, at this point. And Gladio certainly wouldn’t mind a little support.

“I—yeah,” he breathes in and huffs, runs his hands along the shaved short sides of his head. “Yeah, Ignis, you could say that.”

Ignis purses his lips, speaks slowly, like he’s sounding out every word in that crisp accent of his. “Earlier, I believed you to be upset as in anger. I – thought you were upset with Prompto, for reasons that escaped me. Now, I believe you are upset as in distressed, though I cannot claim to understand the reason there either. But I believe I can guess… if I may.”

Gladio tips his head back. “Alright. Guess. First two tries don’t count, though.”

“You’ll have to cut me some slack, then,” Ignis says dryly. Then he exhales softly. “Is it…our struggle against the Empire in particular that has you so unnerved? Or is it the entire prospect of combat in the first place? I assure you, I can understand both.”

“Hmm,” says Gladio, because at the moment his problems are so incredibly, ridiculously specific that Ignis isn’t even close. But, if he feels like being particularly honest… “Yeah?”

Ignis sighs. It doesn’t sound like exasperation, really. It sounds more like tiredness. “We find ourselves in quite the… difficult position, don’t we. I certainly never expected I would be forced to fight this often, never mind all of you.” He pauses. There’s a faint rustling noise. When Ignis continues, it’s with a low, considering tone. “Though I must admit, Prompto _does_ seem to have adapted quite handily despite lacking our years of training. I rather think we all underestimated him, before.”

Gladio lifts his head, slowly. Ignis has his legs crossed, arm on his knee and chin in his hand. He meets Gladio’s stare guilelessly, if with a barely concealed look of concern.

Does he… could he already _know_? Why else would he say something like that? Well, he just said he thought Gladio was angry at Prompto, but – _but_. Gladio leans forward, tentative excitement rising in his chest.

They’ve fought so many MTs, as much as any Lucian squad during the war. All it took was one lucky moment, one unlucky MT with a hole blasted in his helmet, to lead Gladio to the truth. What are the odds that rifleman is the only one they’ve ever unmasked? What are the odds Gladio is the only one among them to have ever happened to notice what their enemies look like under those helmets?

And Ignis is a smart man, with a security clearance nearly as high as Gladio’s and a similarly key position in Noctis’s retinue. Hell, he knew Prompto better than Gladio did before this roadtrip began – if anyone else was in a position to put the clues together, it’d be him. And if he did he’d certainly be discrete about it. It’s Ignis’s _job_ to quietly, skillfully engineer events to go smoothly, to solve problems ideally before anyone else even thinks of them – Gladio can just picture him playing the same game of observation and investigation that’s nearly made a nervous wreck of him.

What if he’s in the same boat as Gladio. What if he’s dropped a leading statement to see how Gladio reacts, if he’ll reveal that he knows the same awful truth?

“I saw – I saw an MT. When we fought them today,” Gladio says, haltingly, hope thick in his throat, “something had – he wasn’t quite dead yet, and something had put a hole in his helmet, so I took it off.”

“Hmm,” Ignis says, looking at him attentively. He waves a hand – gesturing for Gladio to continue.

Gladio leans his elbows on his knees. He locks eyes with Ignis, looks past the reflection of the firelight glinting on his glasses. “I saw his face.”

Ignis pauses. Uses the hand that was cradling his face to adjust his glasses instead. Gladio can see him carefully picking his words.

“That – must have been distressing, yes.”

That – is just about as irritatingly vague as the last thing he said. Gladio exhales slowly, smothering the frustration. Is it really too much to put the ball in Ignis’s court? Gladio has just about _had_ it with subtle, today. He’s fucking drowning in discretion. But – he can’t keep running off assumptions. He has to know for sure, even if he has to force a concrete answer out of the other man.

“Ignis…” Ignis perks up, makes another polite, wordless noise to show he’s listening. Gladio hesitates, trying to decide precisely how blunt to be. “Do you… have you seen… do you know what they look like? Underneath the helmets?”

Another pause, Ignis tilting his head and squinting minutely as he considers the question.

“Well, I hadn’t the chance to think much of it before, but I suppose… MTs must share a similar set of features, given the method by which they’re created. But no, they’re always wearing their helmets. I’ve never seen an MT’s face directly.” He looks sidelong at Gladio, concern and open curiosity on his face, “Is there… something _unusual_ about them?”

Gladio stares at him. He licks his lips, opens his mouth and closes it. He doesn’t know. _Ignis doesn’t know_. He made an idle, innocent comment about Prompto being surprisingly good at fighting and Gladio just _assumed_ that – 

He stands up, almost knocking over his chair. An icy hot anger overtakes him and he wants very badly to spin around and kick the chair instead, or throw it, or hit something with his clenched fists. But he can’t. He can’t, because that would be wrong, but the thing that really stops him is that if he gives in Noctis and Prompto will most certainly hear the commotion and come out to investigate, and then Ignis will tell them what they’ve been talking about and then, well, the whole fucking jig will be up then won’t it?

Ignis is giving him a look now, concern mixed with a muted sort of wariness at Gladio’s seemingly inexplicable fury. Gladio avoids his stare and scowls because it’s not like he can explain himself. It’s bad enough Gladio knows, he can’t possibly tell Ignis. He’d never be able to face Prompto if he did. So it’s just him, then. It’s just him and the horrible secret looming over him and the anger that seizes him when he least needs it and the overwhelming, overpowering necessity to _not give in, stay in control, you can endure this –_

“Gladio,” Ignis says, quietly. Gladio sucks in a breath, feels like he’s drowning. Ignis stares at him, wide-eyed. “Have I – misspoken in some way? What’s—”

Gladio ducks his head too late to hide the tears filling his eyes. The ground of the haven swims under his feet. He hates this. He hates everything about this.

There’s the sound of someone standing up, a few hesitant footsteps. Ignis hovers just out of reach, and Gladio hates him too.

“Gladio,” Gladio reminds himself that Ignis is his friend, and normally someone he finds entirely likable and who has been an invaluable companion during a rather shitty period in both their lives. Yelling at or – Astrals forbid – hitting him would be absolutely unforgivable. “What’s wrong?”

Everything. Everything is wrong. “ Don’t,” his breath hitches  and he grits his teeth , “don’t do that.”

He catches movement in his periphery and glances up. Ignis has stepped back, hands  held loosely behind his back and a miserable slant to his mouth. “ I won’t,” he says,  and he looks unsure  in a way that’s supposed to have been trained out of him. “ Whatever it is – you’ll be fine,” he says,  and hesitates. “Please don’t cry.”

Gladio sniffles a little. Stares at him, irrationally offended by the well-intentioned but completely inadequate attempt to comfort him. He thought – he sort of just assumed Ignis would be good at that kinda thing. It’s sort of ridiculous, actually. This is the man he’d wanted to rely on? The guy who was supposed to be confidant to a king, someday, standing there with his composure crumbling the moment someone started to cry. What a joke. The enormity of it hits him abruptly – Ignis can’t fix this. He can’t help him. There is no one for Gladio to depend on but himself.

“ Oh,” Ignis says,  quiet and pained, as the tears start falling in earnest.  Gladio chokes down a sob, chest heaving, and  spins on his heel.  He  walks away, past the circle of chairs, past the pile of sleepy chocobos – one of them, Ignis’s Lavender, pokes his head up and  _kwehs_ at them.

Ignis swears softly in the distance and follows.

“Gladio, I know you’re – it’s the middle of the night.”

What, does Ignis seriously think he’s going to just wander off and let daemons eat him?  Gladio wipes his face,  nose already dripping. “Yeah, I’ m aware ,”  he says sardonically.

“I—” Ignis sighs.  Something jingles behind him and he turns. Ignis holds out something tiny and silvery – his keys.

“ It should be safe enough, with the high beams on. It’s,” he looks  down , “it’s all I can do. If that’s what you want.”

Guilt and anger twist together in his gut.  Gladio takes the keys.

“ Thanks,” he says quietly.

He walks down to the Regalia, not looking back to see if Ignis watches him go. It’s chilly, in the dark away from the fire, but the hood’s up for the night and that blocks out the breeze. Gladio turns the key halfway, flips on the lights to discourage any daemon bold enough to get this close to a haven. Flips the radio on as well, tuned to a random station, so he doesn’t have to listen to the ugly sound of his own crying.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry to be late again! its a long story, but basically i ended up without access to wifi for awhile there - had to spend a looooot of time playing video games instead u_u  
> but! here it is, the penultimate chapter! i hope i havent misled you poor folks into expecting a longfic cuz uhhhh, the only reason this is done is that it's only 18k total lmao  
> thank you for your patience and enjoy reading~

Gladio remains in the Regalia long after he’s done. He feels like a wet towel that got wrung out and hung to dry, which is nice – he’d really like to savor the emotional distance from his problems while it lasts. He realized, about halfway through, that canvas walls are not very soundproof and it’s entirely possible that the whole conversation was audible to the guys inside, in which case he’s really shot himself in the foot so – he’s staying in the car for the time being.

Eventually he gets bored, but not so bored he wants to face any of the guys just yet. He leans the driver’s seat back, pulls out his phone and considers it. Trying to talk to Ignis didn’t work very well, but he’s beginning to think it was the right sort of approach. Not so much for the emotional support, obviously, but when he thought Ignis might know about Prompto it made him realize how badly he needed solid intel. Searching Prompto’s stuff was a good first step, but – a little bit of snooping does not an investigation make.

And Gladio’s only got one real source of information to tap. The same group that completely failed to realize what Prompto was in the first place, but hey, it’s hardly like he can ask the Empire if they sent any killer cyborg assassins to Lucis.

He unlocks his phone, pulls up his contacts. Pauses. As Marshal, Cor has the right to know about a potential security issue, even if Gladio’s technically no longer his subordinate – maybe. Possibly. Admittedly, if Cor said to jump into Taelpar Craig and Noctis didn’t countermand him, Gladio would take a running start.

Cor also arranged for Prompto’s highly irregular Crownsguard training, going so far as to personally involve himself when he could. But not often, because that’s the thing about Cor – he’s too high up not to be ridiculously busy, and he takes his job dead seriously, even moreso now Gladio’s sure. If Gladio goes digging into Prompto for nothing, he’ll have wasted the Marshal’s time. If Gladio goes digging and finds something… he’ll be told to act on it.

Instead he calls a number much further down his contact list. She takes about three rings to answer, which is just enough time to second guess himself and start panicking.

“Hello?”

Well, too late to hang up now.

“Hey Monica. Hope I’m not calling at a bad time.”

“If you wish to talk, quite the contrary. If it’s an emergency, however, you should call the Marshal. I am currently on a recon mission.”

Gladio rubs his forehead. “No, it’s not an emergency, I, uh—” he fumbles, because _everything’s fine_ would be a lie for so many reasons. “I have it under control. Mostly. It’s no more of a shitstorm than it usually is, I promise.”

“Hmm,” says Monica, dryly. Gladio can’t tell if she knows he’s not telling the whole truth or if she’s struck with the urge to chide him for cussing like he’s a teenager again. “I see. Provide me with what information you can, and I’ll offer assistance to the best of my ability.”

Gladio leans forward, nervous energy making him restless. “Yeah, see, that’s… what I was hoping _you_ could do. Provide me with a little information. The only problem is, well… how good’s your memory, Monica?”

There’s a rustling noise over the line. “Not eidetic, unfortunately, nor photographic, but I do well enough. And I have access to what remains of our intelligence networks, of course, but if you wanted something you thought those could give you, you would have asked after them directly.”

Yeah, no. If their spies know what Gladio wants to ask, he’s got bigger problems than he thought he did. The information he needs was almost certainly destroyed with the Crown City, which is why he has to rely on the memory of a woman he’s only mostly sure has seen the paperwork.

Gladio bites his lip. He really doesn’t want to lie to Monica, but if he can’t tell Ignis what’s really going on then he certainly can’t tell her. So – don’t lie, but don’t tell the truth, and do it in a way she doesn’t get suspicious enough to call his bluff. It’s not that Gladio doesn’t think he can’t talk circles around people if he really has to – he’s the heir to a noble house, he was learning politics by the time most kids were learning their times tables – but just. It’s Monica.

“No, it’s – not really that sort of intel, trust me. Not even that important, really, I just thought—” He grimaces. His lips feel raw and tender when he stretches them, all the loose skin chewed away. “I— may have stuck my foot in my mouth, today. Did some things I regret. Thought maybe you could… clear some things up for me, so I don’t make the same mistakes twice.”

He can _hear_ the raised eyebrow. “I see. I should hate to see you do that, Gladiolus. Ask away.”

Ugh, the full name. Does she gotta full name him?

He can’t keep stalling. Time for the moment of truth. Gladio breathes deeply, grips the steering wheel.

“On paper Cor was Prompto’s primary training officer but – well, that was just on paper. You were one overseeing a lot of his training – and you helped do his background checks from when we brought him in.”

“I did.”

Another breath. He feels unsteady, breathing shallow past the lump in his throat. “Then you know – do you remember when he was adopted? Like, how old he was.”

Monica makes a wordless noise, faintly surprised. She falls silent for a few seconds – in the background, over the line, he can hear the pop and static of a radio. Gladio peels another strip of skin from his lips, tastes gummy chapstick and a hint of copper.

“I believe…” Monica says slowly, her furrowed brow and pursed lips audible, “…if I recall correctly, he was… very young. Two, perhaps? Or a little older.”

Gladio slumps back against the seat. “Two? I… damn. Ok. Alright.”

Prompto would’ve been a toddler, then. Add in however long he’d spent in an orphanage or foster home, plus travel time to reach Insomnia from imperial lands, for a sum of exactly one MT baby taken from whatever facility he’d been born in. His breathing hitches, eyes wet. He’d been just a baby, then. His teeth clench so hard he feels it in his gums. He’d been _just a baby then_. Some bastard fucking Niffs had grown a baby in a vat for the express purpose of raising him as a supersoldier and then… never got to do the raising part, and thus probably not the supersoldier part either. Because little Prompto was already in the Crown City by that point, and Gladio’s not so paranoid yet he thinks the background checks were _completely_ wrong vis a vis Prompto’s contact – specifically, his lack thereof – with known or suspected Nilfheimian agents once he was in Lucis.

“Hey, Monica.”

“Hm?”

But… it doesn’t hurt to be a little paranoid, with circumstances like these. He doesn’t think he can handle having his hopes dashed or his worldview shaken up or his heart broken any more times today.

“Humor me for one more question, okay? Promise it’s important.”

“Of course.”

“You’ve probably seen his medical records, too. Anything strike you as… unusual, about them? Like there’s holes in them, or like the docs found something weird – theirs or ours.”

She’s definitely got both eyebrows raised, this time. “No, not at all. His medical records were perfectly normal. If they weren’t, you would have read about it in his dossier.”

Gladio sucks in a breath before he can stop himself. His hand tightens around the phone. Niff tech is notoriously advanced, but at its heart it’s still all metal and silicone and daemonic power. Background checks can be fooled, but x-rays don’t lie, and neither does bloodwork.

“Gladio,” Monica says slowly, in a tone that has Gladio flinching, “might I ask…?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“The nature of these questions – are they personal or… professional?”

Gladio considers the ceiling. No training, no implants, no motive, nothing he can find that links him to the Empire except the circumstances of his birth…

“…personal,” he murmurs, draping his free arm over his eyes. He tries, but he can’t stop the words from going shaky. Moisture gathers in the crook of his elbow. “It’s personal.”

There’s more rustling over the line. Monica’s voice loses some of that quiet intensity. “I… see.” A beat. “Is there anything else you’d like to discuss?”

Gladio grits his teeth, breathes slowly and deeply until he can banish the quaver in his voice. Snot gathers in his nose but he doesn’t dare sniff. His head flops to the side – out the window, outside, the night is deceptively still and peaceful. The stars are bright.

“If you’ve got time, care to answer one more question? This one’s stupid, though.”

“As I said, I’m presently deployed on a recon mission. At the moment I have nothing _but_ time,” Monica says dryly. “And you are much too smart for stupid questions, Gladio.”

Gladio snorts. “Thanks.” His traitorous voice is still a little too soft. “You ever done something that… you know it’s right, but it doesn’t _feel_ right? So it feels like – like all your options are crap, like you did something wrong, even if you know that ain’t true.”

Monica hums. “I am… acquainted with such a feeling, yes.”

He chuckles again, scratching his neck. “Told ya. Stupid question.”

“It’s not.” There’s quiet for a minute. The faintest noise of knobs being turned, the white noise crackle of the radio shifting into a different frequency. The brief scratch of a pen. Gladio waits, tense, but Monica is the type of woman who gives her words weight, and he’s known her long enough that the silence – careful, considering, companionable – is its own tiny comfort. “If it’s a stupid question,” she says at last, “then I will bet you a considerable amount of gil we few remnants of the Crownsguard have all become idiots.”

_Weren’t_ _we alway_ _s, though,_ Gladio wants to quip. But he doesn’t. Fiddles idly with his fingers, instead, feeling the warped lumpy texture of his own callouses.

“Yeah, I can see that. What with – yeah. We’ve all got it rough, huh.”

“Indeed. Even before the Fall, many of us struggled to reconcile ourselves with the king’s final edict – how were we to be Crownsguard, they felt, when our primary duty was no longer to guard the crown? It is not that they didn’t wish to protect the people, but… much would have changed. And now much is lost.”

Gladio huffs dryly. “Yeah, that’s a hell of an understatement.”

Monica’s voice grows grimmer. “As for myself… I found myself wondering how much the king knew, at the end, even beyond logical speculation when faced with such an offer as we received from the Empire. It seems likely – it seems likely he knew, and Lord Amicitia and the Marshal with him. My only doubt is of how much.”

“You think,” Gladio says, trying to follow, “what, you think His Majesty was trying to prepare the Crownsguard for his death?”

Another careful pause. “Possible. Though one must also consider… as the king prepared to send us of the main department away, he drew the Kingsglaive closer in our place.”

“…and now they’re all dead, huh. Guess defecting didn’t work out too well for anyone.”

Monica’s voice goes low, solemn to Gladio’s bitter edge. “Not all of them.”

Not all of them are dead, she means. Not all of them were traitors, either. It’s the kind of ace up their sleeve that Gladio honestly isn’t sure they should even be referencing over the phone, but – he finds himself asking anyway. An itchy, burrowing sort of curiosity overwhelms his common sense.

“So, how’s that working out for you?” He asks after a moment, trying for casual. “These guys – you trust them?”

“I do,” Monica says, no hesitation – and she is the type of woman who gives her words weight. But then she continues, “There were many Glaives fighting, during the Fall. I saw a few myself, as we fled the city – and if they had not fought, perhaps the Empire could have spared more forces for hunting us down.”

“What, even the Glaives who were fighting us?”

Static crackles softly in the background. “Most of the Glaives fought their own,” Monica says, and again her voice is low. “That is what I have heard. What I have seen. Most of the Glaives killed and were killed by their own. In the end, they tore themselves apart.”

He won’t pretend he isn’t angry at the Glaives for what they’ve done. For awhile everyone believed maybe the Glaives would be it, the piece that turned the tide, a vanguard to protect what was otherwise doomed when all else threatened to fail – until their captain turned out to be _General_ _fucking_ _Glauca_. But it’s hard to hold onto that anger against the sick, secondhand feeling of betrayal curling in his gut. To strike down your own friends…

“Sure helps, doesn’t it.” He says, leaning his head on the steering wheel. “Having someone you trust at your back.”

“It is the only thing that’s kept us alive. It is – one of the only things, that convinces me to continue on.” Monica says bluntly. She pauses. “If I may be frank?”

“’Course. Don’t know where I’d be if you weren’t.”

He’s known Monica for over half his life, and she’s been a Crownsguard officer since he was a child. He won’t pretend he’s always taken her advice, but the least he can do is listen to it.

Static from the radio fills the gap as she seems to gather her words. “Prompto was a good student. Well,” she amends, “for the purpose for which he was being taught. I do not believe he possesses quite the right mindset to be a proper agent.”

Gladio snorts. “Yeah, you don’t say.”

Prompto’s a good shot and a good friend, but he can hardly imagine him as a rank and file Crownsguard – hell, can hardly imagine him as a rank and file _anything_. It made picturing him as a proper MT bizarre, like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. Only to follow the metaphor, then he’d looked closer and realized the peg was actually a hexagon or something.

“But he was a good student, nonetheless. Respectful, diligent, excellent innate reflexes.” Monica gives a regretful little sigh. “I must confess, I wish I’d had a few more months working with him.”

“What, think you could’ve drummed some confidence into him?”

“Oh,” she says, “perhaps, I suppose. No, only that our lessons strictly covered handguns. Pistols are eminently useful but given the circumstances and his skills I do regret we were never able to move onto long guns.”

And _that_ was why Gladio was unsurprised Monica had escaped Insomnia. And that she’d taken over Prompto’s weapons training. And, actually, why she was running what sounded like a bog standard recon mission. There was, and had been, lots of people in the Citadel who excelled at administration – something which took patience, an iron will, the ability to channel seething frustration into something useful. There were considerably less people, in the Citadel and possibly the entire country, who could shoot the whiskers off a coeurl from across a football field.

But Gladio can see where she’s coming from, because again: Prompto’s a good fucking shot, for someone who first picked up a gun months ago. He’d be a menace with something more powerful than a semi-auto pistol or a revolver. Well, he’s already a menace with the ungainly monstrosities Cid keeps fixing up for him, but Gladio has always been secretly terrified he’ll hack his own arms off by accident some day with those. Or get mauled when he tries to get in close with his machinery and forgets he’s the ranged specialist for a reason. Basically, Gladio spent a lot of time worrying about Prompto even before recent revelations.

But now Gladio shakes his head and tries to pay attention, because the last thing he needs is to start spacing out again. “Yeah, that’d be nice.” He pauses. “Though I’m guessing you had more to say about him than just regretting you couldn’t turn him into a mini-you.”

“Ah, of course. My apologies for getting distracted. What I meant to say was – I will not pretend I know everything about Prompto, or that a few months of training him was enough to truly acquaint us. But I paid attention, and I have heard much about him. He seems a fine young man.”

Gladio props his face on a hand, staring out the window at nothing in particular. “Huh. Really?”

“Really. You wish for my advice? If something has… come between you, for whatever reason, work it out. We will not survive without good people at our backs, Gladio, and they won’t survive if we are not at theirs. If you believe you can trust Prompto – and if you wish my personal assessment of him, I believe you can – you have no excuse to hesitate. Or… at least no excuse to not try.”

Gladio gives a dry little half smile. “Hah. So you’re telling me to stop futzing around and get off my ass about it, huh.”

“I am telling you to make it right, Crownsguard. However you feel you must.” Monica tells him solemnly.

“You know,” Gladio says, confidentially, “I was gonna call Cor about this, but then I thought better of it. Cuz I knew he was gonna tell me to do… well… basically the same thing you’re telling me to do now, I guess.”

“The Marshal is a wise man,” Monica says. The thing that makes her Monica is that he genuinely can’t tell if she’s being sarcastic or not. He definitely would be, but he’s always been a banked fire, all sparks buried in the ash just waiting to leap up and singe someone, whereas Monica’s like… Monica’s like an electric heating coil, neatly tamed power lying in wait to burn.

“Yeah, I guess so.” He swipes his thumb over his mouth, looks askance even though she can’t see him over the phone. “And I… you’re right. I’m tired of tiptoeing my way around this. I mean, you know that’s not really my style. Always been a head on sorta guy.”

She shrugs – he can hear it in the rustle of fabric and in her tone. “Well – a shield is just as valuable at the rear as at the front, if not more so. You need only know what it is you protect against.”

Or what it is you’re protecting. _We are the Shield of the King._ _T_ _here is no king without a kingdom. What do we protect?_ Gladio’s already made his choice. All he needs to do is follow through.

– Well, keep following through. It _was_ actually important to make sure the chances of Prompto being a brainwashed imperial assassin were still negligibly low, even if he didn’t enjoy that part in the slightest. Now it’s just time for phase two.

“Yeah… you’re right. Uh, again. For both of those things you said.”

There’s a smile in her voice. “I also have my moments of wisdom.”

Yep, now she’s definitely laughing at him. Which means Gladio should wrap up the call, because facing the rest of the guys is a way less daunting prospect than that of getting gently heckled by a woman with over a decade of blackmail material on him.

“I’m sure you do, ma’am.” He pauses to see if she’s got anything else to say. “Monica, thanks. A lot. I wasn’t – really able to talk to any of the guys about this, but I knew… I knew you could help.”

“I do my best.”

“Of course. And…” He looks out the window again. The stars are still there, the heavens as clear and vivid as it only is in the countryside. Gladio wonders – what does the night sky look like now, in Insomnia? Has the light pollution cleared up any, now that nearabout half the damn city’s gone dark? “You guys hang in there, ok? I know everything’s gone to hell but,” Gladio grins, soft and crooked, remembering Noctis’s attempts at encouragement, “but we’ve got it, yeah? Gonna kick some ass out there. Maybe even save the world.”

“I’m sure you will.” Monica sounds a lot surer than he felt. Or maybe she’s just better at hiding it. “And when you do, the Crownsguard will stand with you, my lord.”

Gladio grimaces. “Astrals. Since when did this become a _my lord_ sorta conversation?”

Technically it always has been, given that Gladio’s the heir to perhaps the most noble house in the kingdom below the royal house itself and Monica’s like… second cousin to an earl, if he remembers correctly. Only Gladio is no longer an heir – he is the Lord Amicitia, and the Shield of a Prince who is all but crowned King. If circumstances were different and he didn’t have to stick by his charge, the Crownsguard could very well be under _his_ command right now, a possibility he devoutly thanks both the Astrals and Cor for preventing.

Thankfully, Monica drops it, and her voice regains that faintly teasing smile. “Be calm, Gladio. It hasn’t. Do you have anything else to add, or shall I leave you to your night?”

Gladio scratches his scruffy chin. “Nah, I’m all good.” He grimaces again, shifting in his seat guiltily. “Oughta leave you to your mission anyhow. Thanks for taking the time to talk to me, I know you’re probably busy as hell right now.”

She exhales softly, a small breathy noise. “As are we all. But the pleasure was mine – I do not have many friends left, of course, nor am I easy to contact. I am glad you chose me.”

Well. Now he’s doubly glad he didn’t call Cor instead. And doubly guilty, the feeling heavy in his guts, because he only called in the first place to get information. About a potential security risk he never planned on telling her about. At least she called him a friend… sixteen year old Gladio would probably have bragged about that, the little shit.

“Well, I’ll just have to call again in a few days, then. Maybe a week. See how things are going,” he says, trying for nonchalance.

“Please do. I would also be interested in the resolution of your… situation, with Prompto. I hope my advice ends up of use.”

“It will be. I’ll fix things on my end, Monica, promise. Told you – I’m a head on kinda guy.”

“I do not doubt it. Good night, Gladio.”

“Night.”

The call ends. Gladio clutches the phone, staring into the distance. He sighs, shoulders drooping, and turns the lights off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> monica is so cool,,,,, one day i will write the crowe & monica buddy cop fic i have in my heart (and whose outline is cluttering up my fic folder,,,,,) because sometimes you just need to get extremely attached to minor female characters who got shafted by canon. for now, please accept this paltry offering instead u_u  
> i am kidding somehow this fic turned out really good. hope you all liked it!  
> the next and final chapter will be coming out on schedule on thursday (hopefully!!) to make up for the delay on this one.


	5. Chapter 5

It’s late when he climbs back up the haven’s base, and from the ethereal blue hue of the light reflecting off the rock it looks like someone put out their campfire. Gladio allows himself the fleeting hope that everyone else is asleep, like sensible people are at this time of night. Almost all of them are.

“Aw, hell,” Gladio mutters under his breath. He clears his throat unnecessarily. “Don’t tell me I kept you up.”

“I won’t, then. I was merely cleaning up after dinner, I assure you.” Ignis says, seated at the chair that gives him the best view of the side of the haven the Regalia is parked on, because unfortunately he is an _exceedingly_ sensible person.

Gladio opens his mouth to ask how long it could possibly take to do that, then closes it, scowling.

“Well,” Ignis amends, crossing his legs, “I _was_ tidying up. At the moment, I’m taking a watch shift. We – the others and I agreed it would be best to continue the usual protocol.”

Which is that they don’t usually set watches unless they think they need to. Gladio is normally all in favor of this, but now it just makes panic rise in his chest. His scowl deepens, teeth clenching under the pressure squeezing his lungs. Did Ignis poke his head into the tent? Was he gone so long Noctis and Prompto came back out? What did they think of Gladio just disappearing for – he prays – no discernible reason?

It’s Ignis’s turn to clear his throat unnecessarily. “I told them you were… taking a short break. To clear your head.”

Gladio makes a soft, strangled noise and gives into the urge to bury his face in his hands. It’s kinda melodramatic of him, but Ignis has already seen him cry today, and if he doesn’t do _something_ he’ll end up right back where he started – with a lot of repressed feelings and nowhere to direct them except at people who don’t deserve them. He’s already done enough damage; it would be nice if he could get through the rest of the night without sabotaging any more relationships.

“Yeah. Sure. Something like that,” he says into his palms. He sits down, because it’s been a long day and there’s no need to make it even longer by loitering. When he looks up, though, Ignis has a faint, uncomfortable expression on his face.

“Gladio,” he begins, hesitant but determined, “I hate to pry, when you made your… feelings from before perfectly clear—”

Gladio blinks, unease shifting low in his gut.

“—but I cannot help but be concerned. I have noticed you having what I suspect were some form of dissociative episodes twice today. You needn’t explain if you don’t wish to, of course. Perhaps I was not the best person to ask. But I really must recommend you speak to _someone_ about whatever it is that’s distressed you so.”

“Uh,” Gladio says, in the face of Ignis’s carefully inoffensive compassion. “ _Oh_ ,” he says, when his mind snags on _dissociative episodes_. “Yeah, no. I’ve got – there’s other stuff going on there, Iggy. That’s not what’s happening.”

Ignis makes a carefully inoffensive noncommittal noise. Gladio scrunches his nose and rubs the back of his neck, unable to come up with an explanation other than the truth he can’t offer. But – he’s sure Ignis would understand if he could. And he’s not going to have any more poorly timed, poorly hidden freakouts about Prompto being an MT now that he’s had the opportunity to sort all of _that_ out. But he appreciates the thought, he really does, which means now he has to find a way to gently deflect Ignis’s worry . _Shit_.

“And I, uh – I did that. Already.” He tries. _Fuck_. He cradles his face with a hand, elbow propped on the armrest, to cover the way his face is beginning to flush. “I called Monica. Earlier. We talked.”

Thankfully, Ignis perks up at that. “You spoke to Monica?” He adjusts his glasses, looking thoughtful. Finally he nods. “That’s excellent – I’m pleased to hear it. She is an admirable woman indeed. A fine choice.”

Gladio snorts. Then he runs a thumb over his mouth, glancing upwards and then back down. “I’m… also gonna get my shit together and talk to Prompto. Later.” He sighs. “Listen, I know I’ve been a bit of an ass to him, but I’m not angry. It’s just – it’s complicated. We need to talk.”

Ignis’ brows are drawn gently down in thought and a wave of despair washes through Gladio. He sends a silent apology to Prompto, because he didn’t intend to practically invite Ignis to figure it out himself after giving him more than a few clues in the bargain but – in his defense, he’s usually much better at discretion. It’s probably the stress. Or the shock. Or the fact that if he fucks it up, they’ll probably all die and doom everyone they care about.

“I see,” Ignis says, which is still terrifying, but then at least he goes, “Well, I’m glad on both accounts, then. Prompto has seemed… worried, about the whole matter, but I hadn’t the chance to speak to him privately about it and – well. You know how he gets.”

“Yeah,” Gladio says with a scowl. He does, and it’s going to make things horribly awkward for awhile, but – if he survived the rest of it, he’s sure he can survive Prompto being sad (and, if he’s being honest about it, kinda annoying) in the future.

There’s a few seconds silence. Fatigue falls over Gladio like fog, slow and rolling. He yawns, tears welling up.

“Ugh,” Gladio rubs the moisture from his eyes and blinks slowly, “it’s too late for this. I’m going to bed.”

He stands, and Ignis follows him. It takes him a moment to realize what’s wrong with that. He squints at the other man.

“Aren’t you taking watch?”

“I am.” Ignis folds his hands together, pauses, unfolds them. Leaves his arms dangling at his sides like he’s not quite sure what to do with them. “I feel as though I must apologize to…” he licks his lips, starts over. “I’m sorry. For whatever it was that I did to further upset you, earlier.”

“Ignis,” Gladio’s brows come down. He frowns. “Don’t think you need to apologize for that, seeing as it wasn’t your fault, but uh – thanks?”

Ignis’s hands find their way to his hips – one of his hands finds its way to his hip, the other comes up to adjust his glasses. His expression is similar but subtly different – brows drawn together, the corners of his mouth dipping down.

“Of course it wasn’t, I won’t pretend that I – I know this must sound somewhat arrogant of me. I – won’t pretend I understand whatever upset you so. But it is clear enough that, intentions to help you aside, my attempt did more harm than good. So I’m sorry. I’ll do better in the future.”

Gladio frowns harder. He remembers – that unbearable pain in Ignis’s face, at the sight of Gladio crying, the almost sick frustration which with he’d offered the car keys. He took it personally – of course he did. The unease in him grows, and he thinks – Ignis waited there, the whole time. Thinking he’d failed him. Stars and Astrals. Gladio is such a horrible friend, sometimes.

Ignis’s mouth gets minutely thinner as Gladio closes the distance, his posture minutely straighter. Gladio points at him.

“Do me a favor and stay still for a sec, won’t ya?”

Ignis nods, determinedly. Then his head bobs again as Gladio gives him a light smack upside the skull. He points at him more firmly, this time, Ignis’s gaze actually going slightly cross eyed as he looks at the finger almost touching his nose.

“Idiot,” Gladio says, low and rough. He wraps his arms around him. “Now hug me back.”

Ignis obeys. He doesn’t mold himself to the touch or anything, but he holds on tightly. Seemingly by reflex, Ignis pats him on the back – once, twice, his hand a brief spot of warmth through the back of Gladio’s tanktop. Gladio thinks idly – _wow, he really is bad at this_.

After a few moments, Gladio pulls away. He points a third time.

“Don’t make me explain twice, Scientia.”

Ignis’ voice is quiet. “I won’t.” Gladio yawns again, hard enough to nearly crack his jaw. Ignis inclines his head towards the tent. “You ought to be abed. It’s late.”

“Hell yeah it is,” Gladio says, sleepily but emphatically. He claps Ignis on the shoulder and walks away. “’Night, Iggy.”

“Good night, Gladio.”

Gladio gets halfway to the tent and pauses, cursing under his breath. He turns – Ignis has taken his seat back, the same one also happening to be the chair closest to the tent.

“Wait. Shit. Am I taking a shift?”

Ignis shakes his head. “You needn’t. Prompto and I decided to split the watch between us, with Noctis driving tomorrow.”

Gladio snorts. “Can’t trust our prince with any shift but first, huh.” It’s true – Noctis always has to take first shift for watches, because it’s hell on them waking him up in the middle of the night and hell on him trying to stay awake if they do. Though given what Ignis thinks of Noct’s driving skills, he’s hardly going to be getting any rest in the back seat tomorrow.

Ignis only shrugs in response. Gladio leaves him to it and climbs inside the tent.

Inside it’s warm, Noctis and Prompto filling the air with a susurrus of soft sleepy breathing. They’re hogging the middle, too, leaving Gladio hardly any space to move around. An excellent excuse to skip everything except kicking off his boots before he climbs into a sleeping bag someone else has already laid out. He’s exhausted in more ways than one and falls asleep fast and easy.

 

Gladio wakes up to someone jabbing his leg repeatedly and hissing, “Wake up! Wakeupwakeupwakeup” with just enough fear that his brain – running off years of training and weeks of living as a fugitive – skips drowsiness entirely and slams straight into full alert.

And for good reason, because he sits up to the sight of Prompto – narrow-lipped, fully dressed, pistol still in hand.

“There’s a dropship heading _straight for us_ and I’m pretty fucking sure they’re not looking for a place to wait out the night, dude.”

Ah. Of course. The response team for the dead patrol from yesterday. Gladio sighs deeply, pinching the bridge of his nose, and prods Noctis while Prompto dismisses his gun and moves onto shaking Ignis awake.

“Hey, Noct,” Gladio grumbles, his voice low and gravelly with exhaustion, “Get up. We gotta fight.”

Noctis drags himself upright and rubs the crust from his eyes.

“Imperials?”

“Eyup.”

Ignis takes a full three seconds longer to wake up – Prompto must’ve already relieved him of the watch. He looks like death warmed over, and flicks his glasses open with a truly miserable expression.

“We fighting or just laying low ‘n hoping they move on?” Noctis asks, stretching with his hands laced over his head.

Prompto shakes his head. “Already got the spotlights on, dude.” And sure enough, there’s light shining through the canvas walls too strong and stark to be cast by runes. “Guess we should be glad the Empire likes their nice, slow, terrifying approaches – gives a body a chance to contemplate their own imminent death before it happens. Very sportsmanlike of them.”

Gladio grunts, shimmying out of his sleeping bag and leaning over to grab his boots. “Stop rambling and get the chocobos moving, will you?”

It comes out harsher than he meant it to, but, well. Now of all times he doesn’t have the energy or the luxury of dwelling on it. It gets the job done – everything else he can deal with later. He laces up his boots and gets out there.

Sure enough, a dropship is drifting slowly into position to drop a squad on their heads – the landing ramp’s not even opening yet, but it will be very soon. Since the Empire is being obvious about it, they abandon pretenses as well. Prompto gets the chocobos up and moving from their fluffy pile on the rock, getting them to drop down and huddle against the opposite side of the haven the dropship is approaching from. The birds – all one of the breeds favored by hunters – are well enough trained that they’ll stay put there, which is the best they can do to keep them safe.

Gladio, meanwhile, heads in the other direction and does a quick set of warmup stretches. Arms up, arms down to touch his toes, stick his leg out and stretch his hamstrings. Prompto comes up next to him, pulling his gun back out of the armory, seemingly content to wait for the MTs – well, the _other_ MTs – to show up.

Gladio can’t help frowning – if Prompto were smart, he’d be stretching too. Mobility is key in any battle, even if you’re the ranged specialist. And he always summons his gun before he needs it, too, treats the thing like a damn security blanket. Gladio _should_ have told him off for bringing a gun into the tent, even if the safety was on – it’s like he hasn’t quite gotten it through his head that with a connection to the armory, your weapon is always within reach. It’s so easy to tell the difference between Prompto and properly trained combatants like the rest of them – he’d be so much stronger if he only had a little more discipline.

But – he remembers Monica’s blunt, fond assessment. _He was a good student_. Prompto’s face is drawn and distant with nerves – his usual pre-fight expression – but he holds his pistol in a firm two-handed grip. He stands next to Gladio and faces the oncoming enemy, unknowing or uncaring that they’re just like him under all that armor.

But Gladio knows and Gladio – Gladio cannot quite not care. He glances sidelong at Prompto, his own nerves starting to crawl hot and sick up his throat. Perhaps Prompto isn’t much like the other MTs at all. He’s not really like Gladio either, though. Perhaps he is something altogether different.

Gladio looks at him and wants to find out what.

“Hey.” Prompto flashes him a tight look, lips pinched, shouldering Gladio’s attention like a burden. Which hurts but hey – fair enough. Gladio looks him in the eyes, though, and jerks his head back towards the others. “Help me keep an eye on Ignis, yeah? He looks dead on his feet – I’m gonna be too busy pulling his weight to make sure he doesn’t beef it out there. Noct too – said yesterday his knee was acting up.”

Prompto blinks. Glances back at Ignis, who’s chugging a can of Ebony in a bleary but determined fashion, and Noctis who watches him with a faintly disgusted expression. “I— yeah. Of course.” He looks back at Gladio and visibly puffs himself up, giving Gladio his best cheery smile. “Prompto’s on the job, dude! They’re safe with me.”

Gladio smiles back at that – not a grin or a smirk, but something small and earnest.

“Yeah. They are.”

Prompto’s eyes go a little wider, sparkling light reflecting off them as Gladio summons his greatsword and turns back to the dropship. The landing ramp is lowering into position – the units inside beginning to march forward.

Gladio lowers himself into a ready stance, weight pressed down like a coiled spring, awaiting the noise of the safety clicking off on Prompto’s pistol.

 

Later – hours later – they’re just about to reach Malmalam Thicket. Perhaps not quite far enough, but their attempt to properly make distance and lay low was somewhat thwarted by the strain of waking up in the middle of the night to fight off a squad of MTs, followed by hastily packing up camp and leaving in case reinforcements showed up, and then fighting an Iron Giant who wandered into the road as they were driving.

Eventually, when the sun has risen and they’re surrounded by thick forest foliage, Noctis announces they’re pulling over, hiding the Regalia as best they can, and taking a _godsdamned_ nap – a plan only altered for the hasty assemblage of sandwiches made with luncheon meat and bread Ignis bought in Old Lestallum.

Gladio protests not at all, because sandwiches and a nap sound heavenly. So he eats in tired silence, and happily curls up in his sleeping bag on the floor of an abandoned barn, and for the second time he falls asleep without hesitation.

Unlike last time, this time he comes awake naturally. Ignis is softly snoring in his ear, Noctis’s foot has somehow escaped his sleeping bag and is hooked over Gladio’s leg, and Prompto has bedhead so bad his hair might end up permanently glued together with sweat and hair gel. Did they start out clustered together as close as they are in the tent? Gladio can’t remember. His brain only knows it’s warm, and drowsy, and safe.

Then he remembers. Yesterday; the horror and uncertainty of his discovery, every slight inflicted on Prompto, Monica telling him to _make it right_. Gladio groans out loud and rolls over. He wants, very badly, to fall back asleep and deal with his responsibilities any other time but now. Any other time but right after the shitstorm that yesterday turned into, all because he had the simple dumb luck to unmask an MT.

All because of luck… Gladio frowns up at the dusty rafters. It’s just like he realized before – they fight MTs pretty frequently. Wait long enough, and it won’t matter if he never says a damn thing – _someone_ will end up seeing underneath one of those helmets. It might not even be one of the guys, the Crownsguard are doing a lot of recon and assisting hunters nowadays but when they have to, they fight, and the Empire hunts anyone who still resists them.

It… might not even be a Lucian at all. Gladio bites his lip, gut clenching, a new and terrifying possibility coming to him. What if it’s not someone from their side realizing that Prompto’s an MT – what if it’s a _Niff_ realizing that _Noctis’s best friend_ is? That would be – that would be bad. Very bad.

Gladio rolls over so he’s facing an empty wall, snaking a hand up to his mouth and trying to quiet his breathing. They can’t have him. They can’t have him. They _won’t_ have him. Gladio will protect Prompto from his own people _and_ the Niffs if need be and needs do most certainly fucking be, because Prompto doesn’t deserve whatever they’d do to him and none of them deserve what his loss would do to _them_. Astrals – Regis is dead and Lady Lunafreya is gods only know where, if something happened to Prompto Noctis might just break.

Well. Now he _has_ to stop beating around the bush. Gladio needs backup, and he needs to explain himself to Prompto anyway. And sooner rather than later, before he loses his nerve or something else happens.

Gladio takes a deep breath, eyes closed. And he was having such a _nice_ nap…

He crawls out of his sleeping bag and feels heavy with regret. Prompto looks peaceful, comfortable, and Gladio’s about to ruin it all for him. Possibly for awhile. But – duty calls. He pokes him until he wakes up with a sleepy murmur and looks up to see Gladio with a finger over his lips. He stands up and beckons, and Prompto follows him to the other side of the barn where the Regalia is parked.

“What’s up, big guy?” Prompto says, blinking up at him and folding his arms over his stomach.

Gladio scratches the back of his head, tries to keep the grimace off his face. This is already so painfully awkward. “We, uh, can we talk? In private?”

Prompto recoils a little. His eyes go wide and worried. “Oh. I, um, well – Sure? Maybe?” He pauses. Visibly gathers the gumption to ask – “Bad news?”

Gladio, in the middle of trying to usher him out the barn doors for some actual privacy, pauses. There is… really no way to answer that both reassuringly and truthfully, is there? And unfortunately that’s answer enough for Prompto, who wilts.

Gladio feels like an absolute prick, but he still can’t think of anything to say but – “Eh – maybe? Kinda. Listen, it’s… complicated.”

They go around to the side of the barn, where there’s a few old crates and barrels left to rot next to the wall. Gladio doesn’t even try to sit on one – he figures this is probably a standing sort of conversation anyway – and Prompto doesn’t either.

Instead Prompto balls his fists loosely, and straightens up to his full height, and with a transparent sort of bravery looks at Gladio and asks –

“Alright. So. What do you gotta tell me?”

Gladio finds himself following suit – hands curled, back straight, calling on courage as fake as Prompto’s. There’s no going back. He can do this.

He can do this if it means not being alone with this secret anymore.

“Yeah, so. You remember the hunt we took, yesterday? The first one—”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thats it!! its done!! hope you all liked it~  
> sadly i don't have anything else finished and ready to publish at the moment. i DO have a 30k vampire au fic that's fully written, but i made the mistake of trying to get it beta'd. all at once. when my very good friend and sometime-beta whomst i depend on endlessly was just gearing up to move across the country and start a new job. BUT it will be done eventually. i've also been toying for a long time with the idea of writing some sort of coda for this (i,,,, may have written this entire thing before i so much as played episode prompto), but we'll see if the old muse ever strikes. thanks for your patience and your attention, hope to see you all again soon~  
> also, finally and very belatedly, let me thank inktail and buffpidgey who as always supported and enabled me. ffxv group chat on discord has been my guiding light lmao you guys are great.

**Author's Note:**

> as i said, this fic is 100% done so rejoice that i never publish anything without finishing it. i'm looking to release a chapter a week, hopefully it'll be consistent down to the day but that is depending on if i remember. thanks for reading~


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